sexism in Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes
These macros make me very happy. Maybe for DragonCon I'll dress up as a "Vote Saxon" campaign worker? I could have a sign. And pins. And pro-Saxon literature. Don't laugh; it'd be an easy costume. :P
***
I rewatched the first season of Life on Mars this weekend. I was worried that the crappiness of Ashes to Ashes would negatively effect my opinion of it, but nope; I love it more than ever. If anything, the failures of Ashes to Ashes just make the awesomeness of Life on Mars stand out even more.
I already bitched about what I disliked in Ashes to Ashes; basically I think it epitomizes the idea of the male gaze. It treats the female lead as an object to be ogled, not as a true protagonist for the audience to identify with (that honor is reserved for an over-the-top version of Gene Hunt).
There's a great scene in the premiere of Life on Mars that shows such a nuanced understanding of sexism that it just blows my mind that the same people could screw up so badly on Ashes to Ashes. It's the scene where Sam asks Annie to help him create a psychological profile of the killer they're seeking. He's already talked to her in private and discovered that she's got a BA in psychology and is the most well-spoken person he's met in 1973.
So Sam calls her forward in front of the team of men, and the scene is painfully uncomfortable. Here's Annie, with this stupid nervous grin plastered on her face, trying to look harmless, while the men yell out rude and objectifying comments, and we in the audience know that she's smarter than all of them. She plays along with Sam and shows how smart she is, but the rest of the team just dismiss her with more nasty sexism than ever.
As well meaning as Sam is, it's obvious that he just doesn't get what life is like for a woman in her position. He expects her to behave as an equal, and to thank him for treating her as such. He doesn't understand the systematic oppression that she lives under, and that she's had to learn to get as far as she can while seeming harmless and nonthreatening to the men around her. Sam treating her like an equal is just going to cause the idiots around her to give her more trouble and make her life more difficult.
I like Annie a lot better on rewatch. The first time around it just drove me crazy that she didn't stand up more to the treatment she received, but looking at it again, it's pretty clear that she's doing the best she can while carefully treading a very thin line. It's such a realistic portrayal of how a strong woman would have to act in that environment. She's smarter than anyone, but she has to keep her head down and not scare the men; Gene nearly fires her the one time she dares talk back to him. But the show clearly portrays how smart she is and what a difficult position she's in.
So how did they go from that to Ashes to Ashes? Alex showing up in 1981 dressed as a prostitute, running around in a miniskirt for the whole episode, letting Gene grope her and not slapping him in response?
I think you can already see the seeds of it in Life on Mars season two; they'd started to get so caught up in the Gene Hunt hype that they forgot that "refreshingly non-PC" has a real (sexist, racist, homophobic) dark side. Unfortunately Ashes to Ashes takes that to a whole new (ugly) level; at least Life on Mars always had Sam there to counter Gene's excesses. I'm sure they didn't want to make Alex a Sam clone, but they've erred in not having someone to stand up to that side of Gene. And obviously they're trying to do a big fun over-the-top pastiche, but sexism isn't fun.
***
I really love Life on Mars, but there are a couple of things about it that kind of bother me. (But in the good way, really; I love that it makes me think so much.) One is the creators saying they toned down Gene's racism, but left in the sexism and homophobia, because the racism made him too unlikeable. It says something really depressing about our culture that sexism and homophobia are still so acceptable.
(And it's really depressing to see articles by women going "I know it's un-PC, but I just want to be ravished by a big sexist brute like Gene Hunt!" It's fine if you're just getting off on the fantasy, but some of it has the undertone that they'd really like to see the world controlled by men like this again. You know, a world where the most intelligent person in the room will never get promoted because she hasn't got a penis.)
The other thing that bothers me is that part of the reason Sam opted to remain in 1973 is because it was a place where white men had a lot more power. Sure, Sam's a well-meaning guy and he tries to counter the racism and sexism he encounters, but ultimately he likes that he has so much more social power there. It's a place where he can act without having to worry about the rules and social constraints of the future. I highly doubt that a woman or person of color would've so easily been able to choose 1973 over 2006.
[Cross-posted to InsaneJournal]
***
I rewatched the first season of Life on Mars this weekend. I was worried that the crappiness of Ashes to Ashes would negatively effect my opinion of it, but nope; I love it more than ever. If anything, the failures of Ashes to Ashes just make the awesomeness of Life on Mars stand out even more.
I already bitched about what I disliked in Ashes to Ashes; basically I think it epitomizes the idea of the male gaze. It treats the female lead as an object to be ogled, not as a true protagonist for the audience to identify with (that honor is reserved for an over-the-top version of Gene Hunt).
There's a great scene in the premiere of Life on Mars that shows such a nuanced understanding of sexism that it just blows my mind that the same people could screw up so badly on Ashes to Ashes. It's the scene where Sam asks Annie to help him create a psychological profile of the killer they're seeking. He's already talked to her in private and discovered that she's got a BA in psychology and is the most well-spoken person he's met in 1973.
So Sam calls her forward in front of the team of men, and the scene is painfully uncomfortable. Here's Annie, with this stupid nervous grin plastered on her face, trying to look harmless, while the men yell out rude and objectifying comments, and we in the audience know that she's smarter than all of them. She plays along with Sam and shows how smart she is, but the rest of the team just dismiss her with more nasty sexism than ever.
As well meaning as Sam is, it's obvious that he just doesn't get what life is like for a woman in her position. He expects her to behave as an equal, and to thank him for treating her as such. He doesn't understand the systematic oppression that she lives under, and that she's had to learn to get as far as she can while seeming harmless and nonthreatening to the men around her. Sam treating her like an equal is just going to cause the idiots around her to give her more trouble and make her life more difficult.
I like Annie a lot better on rewatch. The first time around it just drove me crazy that she didn't stand up more to the treatment she received, but looking at it again, it's pretty clear that she's doing the best she can while carefully treading a very thin line. It's such a realistic portrayal of how a strong woman would have to act in that environment. She's smarter than anyone, but she has to keep her head down and not scare the men; Gene nearly fires her the one time she dares talk back to him. But the show clearly portrays how smart she is and what a difficult position she's in.
So how did they go from that to Ashes to Ashes? Alex showing up in 1981 dressed as a prostitute, running around in a miniskirt for the whole episode, letting Gene grope her and not slapping him in response?
I think you can already see the seeds of it in Life on Mars season two; they'd started to get so caught up in the Gene Hunt hype that they forgot that "refreshingly non-PC" has a real (sexist, racist, homophobic) dark side. Unfortunately Ashes to Ashes takes that to a whole new (ugly) level; at least Life on Mars always had Sam there to counter Gene's excesses. I'm sure they didn't want to make Alex a Sam clone, but they've erred in not having someone to stand up to that side of Gene. And obviously they're trying to do a big fun over-the-top pastiche, but sexism isn't fun.
***
I really love Life on Mars, but there are a couple of things about it that kind of bother me. (But in the good way, really; I love that it makes me think so much.) One is the creators saying they toned down Gene's racism, but left in the sexism and homophobia, because the racism made him too unlikeable. It says something really depressing about our culture that sexism and homophobia are still so acceptable.
(And it's really depressing to see articles by women going "I know it's un-PC, but I just want to be ravished by a big sexist brute like Gene Hunt!" It's fine if you're just getting off on the fantasy, but some of it has the undertone that they'd really like to see the world controlled by men like this again. You know, a world where the most intelligent person in the room will never get promoted because she hasn't got a penis.)
The other thing that bothers me is that part of the reason Sam opted to remain in 1973 is because it was a place where white men had a lot more power. Sure, Sam's a well-meaning guy and he tries to counter the racism and sexism he encounters, but ultimately he likes that he has so much more social power there. It's a place where he can act without having to worry about the rules and social constraints of the future. I highly doubt that a woman or person of color would've so easily been able to choose 1973 over 2006.
[Cross-posted to InsaneJournal]